Hornby Castle

[Maz066]

In 2012 I bought R2459 Wellington a Hornby castle. My favourite class of loco. However this one has never been a good runner. You can have sessions and she runs as sweet as a bird. Then you reverse it and it stalls and stutters in both directions. So consequently it doesn't get much running.
I decided to strip it down to basics. Motor out, pickups off, wheel sets out, con rods off, pistons off. It then runs sweetly by pushing- no locking up or rough bits.
Then I began to re-assemble.
With all con rods it was still good
Added pistons and things went wrong
Sfter many hours spent, it was the crank pin which fouled the piston crosshead when the side play was a particular way. This has since sprung the piston assembly

Or perhaps I have got something round the wrong way (Never happened before ) like the connecting rods but I dont think so. It follows the Hornby sheet
Can you have a look at the attached

really appreciate any help. This is doing my head in

[Walkingthedog]

Think the little hole in the crosshead should be at the top. Not sure if that will make any difference.

[cadman]

Looking at the two photos the con rods and pistons are in the same position on both sides so there is no quartering, that's the problem.

[brian1951]

Well spotted Howard.

[Maz066]

There is quartering, the wheels turned between photos

[cadman]

So there is Peter, as clearly shown in the bottom photo.

[Mountain Goat]

Also, it looks like one of the piston rods is either the wrong way round or there are two left hand (Or two right hand) pistons rods? The pistons themselves are the right way up (Though they could both be upsidown? No idea).

What drew my eye was the oiling points for the piston rods... One was one way up on one side and the other was the other way up on the other side.

Well done for spotting the wheel quartering issue. I was so concentrating on any smaller detail that I did not spot it myself until it was mentioned! That will be the number one issue that needs sorting! If one piston rod is upsidown or back to front etc, it won't normally effect running, but the wheels not being quartered will 100% effect the running!

[Walkingthedog]

MG I noticed one of the rods was upside down. There is a small hole in the crossheads. All pictures show the hole at the top but on this loco they are at the bottom. Not sure if the crossheads are symmetric but they may not be. It might make a difference.

[Mountain Goat]

I once bought a Bachmann 4-6-0 chassis for a standard class loco. (I happened to have a body and a tender). The con rods were on upsidown on the chassis. The tiny spring clips held them in place. I can't remember if I dare not try or if I did put the con-rods the right way up, but it ran really well. A friend bought it from me at an attractive price, as though I paid a lot out to get it running wirh a new chassis and new Romford or Makit tender wheels and bearings, which were not cheap, I was given the loco body and the tender (Or had it cheap in with other things) so it covered the costs of doing it up and getting it running, so I did not loose out other then in time and patience and was able to sell it to its new happy owner. I am pretty sure I did turn the con rods the correct way round though. Not that it really makes a difference.

[Maz066]

Thanks Gents. I think you are right. One of the crossheads and rods are upside down. Well trying to move the slides out slightly from the driving wheels they snapped. Oh well back to Peter's Spares but they are out of stock. Guess it goes into mothballs till I can get a new cylinder assembly .